We are glad you are considering applying to do graduate work in History at the University of Tennessee. On this page, you will find information about the History Department’s deadlines and admission procedures.

The deadline for Fall admission is December 1. You will be submitting your application materials through UT’s Graduate Admissions Office. For a direct link to the online application, click the link below. Please note that we only consider applications once a year. Applications must be complete before we will review them, and students who do not meet the deadlines outlined below will need to wait for next year’s cycle to apply.

Our Graduate Programs

We accept applications for the MA and the PhD in History. You will find a basic description of our program requirements for the MA degree here, and for the PhD here.  For more detailed information, please consult our Department’s Graduate Handbook. Students may apply to our PhD program either directly from the BA or from other MA programs. While most of our graduate students were undergraduate history majors, we also sometimes accept students with backgrounds in related fields.

For students who have no current plans to continue on for the doctorate, we also offer a terminal MA in History.

As part of our admission process, we also evaluate applicants for departmental funding. For more information on the financial support the Department has available, click here. Please let us know in your letter of scholarly intent if you do not need to be considered for funding. PLEASE NOTE: In most cases, we only provide funding support to students who are enrolled in our PhD program. MA students are offered funding only in highly unusual circumstances.

Application Procedure

Your application to the History Department will be submitted online through the UT Graduate School’s general admissions portal, found here.

All of your materials must be submitted through this online system. Please do not have materials mailed to the university.

Both MA and PhD applicants are required to submit the following materials:

• Online Graduate School application
• Nonrefundable application fee ($60)
• Transcripts for all previously attended colleges and universities
• Three recommendations from people familiar with your academic abilities and scholarly potential
• A writing sample (approx. 15-30 pages)
• A statement of scholarly interest that describes your intended field of study and your professional goals (750 words)
• A current CV or resume
• Applicants whose native language is not English must also submit documentation of their English-language proficiency. For more details, please see the Graduate Admissions website for further instructions. 
• Optional – Graduate Record Examination scores. Candidates may submit GRE scores if they have them, and strong scores will augment an application. However, there is no penalty for not submitting scores, and we do not require official GRE scores for admission.

The History Department will review all applications and make decisions about admission in the early spring. Once admissions decisions have been made, students will receive notification of their admission status from the Graduate School, with additional information following soon thereafter from the History Department.